Sunday Morning Hiking Ser. #69- In Thayne Sledding Event Cache

Series Description

For those new to this hiking series, these are social hikes around the Salt Lake area for the purpose of caching, enjoying the outdoors, and getting to know fellow cachers. There tends to be a range of fitness levels that show up for the hikes. As the emphasis is on being social, don't worry if a steep leaves you puffing. I'll be right there clinging to a tree and puffing with you. Our usual meeting time is 8am, and we leave the parking area by 8:05am. The other primary feature of these hikes is that they are short and can be accomplished by noon. Trails tend to be a little emptier on Sunday mornings and we'll be done in time for anyone who has Sunday obligations to attend an afternoon service. If you don't have to be anywhere in the afternoon, there's frequently a longer trail to take. If you would like more information about the whole series of hikes, check out the others in the series in the bookmark list at the right.

NOTE FOR NON-CACHERS: Since there has been a trend toward non-cachers joining us due to cross posting of hikes on hiking groups, just a heads-up. Yes, it's a hike and you are certainly welcome to join us. However, it is a caching hike which means if there are caches along the trail we are going to go search for them. That may mean stepping off the trail briefly or an involved search and/or bushwhack off trail. We are happy to teach you about geocaching. We like to spread our obsession. Just come with the expectation that there will be detours from the trail and it will likely take longer to do the hike with this group than most other groups you've gone with. Searching the woods for a piece of paper in tupperware using billion dollar satellites is fun. Try it, you might like it.

Description for this Hike

It's time for the annual sledding hike! Usually we hike and find caches along the way. There is only one cache along this trail because it is mostly in wilderness area. So the fun on this one is we hike up as far as the snow will let us, and it gets deep near the top, then descend far more rapidly on sleds along the natural "bob sled" run formed by the trail. The hike is in Thayne's Canyon and the mode of descent leads to lisping jokes of being insane, just ask girl_friday. It's actually a heck of a lot of fun! I recommend some kind of light-weight sled that you can carry up and steer on the way down. Unsteerable sleds, like round saucers, can be fun yet result in many spectacular, uhm, landings. Again just ask girl_friday and her knuckles. Actually I think there should be far more snow with this early March date. Last year in early January there were definitely a few rocks that hadn't been covered yet. daphm has a couple extra sleds so you may want to shoot her a note if you would like to borrow one.

Snowshoes are pretty necessary on the upper parts of this trail, not a lot of traffic to pack it down. The trailhead is up Mill Creek canyon so there is a $3 fee to exit.If anyone wants to meet at the park & ride at 7:30 to ride with me and my pass let me know. Although it's an odd day and dogs are technically allowed on the trail, dogs and sleds don't usually mix well so it might be best for fido to stay home on this one.